Woman Mutilated Corpse At Funeral, Will Serve 16 Years

An Oklahoma woman has been sentenced to 16 years in prison for mutilating a corpse during a funeral home viewing.

Shaynna Sims, 28, was arrested in 2015 for cutting off both breasts and a toe from the corpse of her husband's ex-girlfriend Tabatha Lynch, 38.

Sims, a makeup artist, was supposed to help prepare the body for the funeral. But, just before the public viewing of the body, witnesses say Sims reached into the casket and slashed the body with a knife, reports the Daily Mail.

Attendees say the dead woman's face was also slashed and that her hair was cut off.

"She had makeup and lipstick smeared all over her face; her hair was just all over the place," said Charlotte Wheeler, Lynch's mother.

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Funeral director Robert Gardner testified that two women entered his office during the funeral saying that somebody "pulled a glob of hair" from Lynch's head and had left it on the floor.

Lynch's missing breasts and toe were never found.

According to Tulsa World, Sims left the funeral home for Lynch's old apartment. She posed as a funeral home employee to enter the apartment complex, where she then attempted to steal Lynch's jewelry.

She had also taken a pair of the victim's shoes from the viewing facility.

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Police arrived soon after and arrested Sims at the dead woman's apartment. Arresting officers say she was found carrying a knife that had Lynch's hair on it.

During the trial, Assistant District Attorney Reagan Reininger said Sims was a "scorned wife" who was "so eaten up" over the idea that her husband was having an extramarital affair with Lynch.

Prosecutors said defense attorneys were "slut shaming" Lynch for having an affair with Sims' now estranged husband, Montie Smith, reports the Daily Mail. Reininger denied the accusation, and instead tried to characterize Sims as "not in the right state of mind."

"We understand a person being jealous; we understand a person being angry," said Assistant District Attorney Tanya Wilson after Sims' conviction. "And she probably had every right to be, but ... she took it a step too far."

Sims was convicted of multiple charges, including unlawful removal of a body part from a deceased person, disturbing or interrupting a funeral, unauthorized dissection, knowingly receiving or concealing stolen property and first-degree burglary.

She was sentenced to 16 years in prison on June 2, and was ordered to pay an additional $6,500 fine. The judge declined to give Sims credit for time served since the crime took place in 2015 and also granted the prosecutor's request that sentences be served consecutively, rather than concurrently.